someday i will write and post my 10,000 page thesis essay about how in miraculous the yin themed characters (characters who wear primarily dark colors over white undershirts) are thoughtful schemers who live mostly within their own heads (marinette, luka, felix, amelie) while the yang themed characters (white over dark undershirts) don't think so much as they DO and are straightforward and action-driven (adrien, kagami, emilie) but that would require having the attention span to do so

The London special did so much for Marinette’s character and I think a lot of people are just ignoring it due to them being disapproving of her decision to lie to Adrien.

But like that’s the point.

I don’t think there’s a single moment in the special that frames Marinette’s decision as a good thing, instead it is presented as a choice that Marinette isn’t confident in but ultimately makes due to a fear of the consequences of the alternative option.

When asked, Bunnix, who knows the full outcome of this decision, doesn’t tell Marinette whether what she did was the right thing to do, only that the important part is how she “owns up” to her decision and how she acts from here.

While Nathalie and Kagami, the only other characters we see react to her plan, actively disagree with Marinette’s choice but follow it regardless because it is Ladybug’s choice to make.

Only she has the position to make this choice.

It is a burden she chooses to put upon herself because more than anything she wants to protect Adrien. Because Marinette, at 14 years old thrust into an incredibly complex emotional situation, does not know what the right decision is and can only hope she makes the right choice. So she follows her heart and sacrifices her mental state in an attempt to save Adrien’s in anyway she can.

And It breaks her… You can see it in her eyes and hear it in her voice. It’s haunting. She hates this decision more than anyone else possibly could, she can hardly bring herself to tell Adrien her lie and yet she still does. It adds so much depth and weight to her character and her actions. It makes her interesting.

Hoping that the anime does have Ruby take the center position between Main Stay and Scandal now 🙏

At the Edge of Time Scene analysis : Tilting with the Balance

Loving the tilting camera on every shot facing Adrien after he hears the news. It starts when Adrien loses his footing and fell on his bed.

Please bare with this essay format, I only have screenshots at my disposal, but to tell you the truth, this whole scene should have been a video essay. It would be easier to do justice to work put behind, the storyboard, the camera work and the animation.

Anyway, spoilers ahead.

Kana, sweetheart, if only you knew. Just after she boasts she knew him the longest too. Come to think of it, that industry advice in general is mess up to say to kid actors even if they didn't lose a parent.

Akane, you would be a great detective, but if you gotta cheer him up, why can't you act as yourself instead of switching into Ai mode? Acting like his mom will only hurt the both of you in the long run.

And Aqua, hearing you say that your sister got over it just means you aren't the only actor in the family...

The stars in Akane's eyes don't 100% mean she's acting like Ai. She got them for the role, sure, but as we know, Ruby and Aqua also have one in their eyes. The star implies their talent, not the characteristics of Ai. For Akane, her talent is basically being highly deductive and piecing everything together, something that helps her understand her acting roles. We even saw it when she was trying to get into the character of Princess Saya. Thanks to the anime, it is now even more emphasized that, when she was talking to Aqua, she didn't change her voice tone to Ai's cheerful or joking tone, but kept her soft and shy style, implying that she was still herself. But with a lot of new information about Aqua and his situation.

I can understand that "star eye" symbolizes high talent to be literally a star in the entertainment industry, but my comprehension is that the "star eye" also means a high connection with Ai. Either by blood (her kids), emotionally (their trauma) or spiritually (Akane).

In Akane's case, they started appear after adamantly studying Ai through and through. So while she never met her, she can enter in her persona. On stage, I have no problem believing she is acting and driving people's attention, but when it comes to Aqua, we know Akane loves Aqua and knows that Aqua likes girls like Ai.

So, I am sorry, but I cannot help but shake that feeling that whenever the star appear on her eyes for Akane (because they come as they go), it means she is adapting by taking inspiration of Ai's aura and pouring it into her persona.

Sure, she better understood the connection between Ai and Aqua and Ruby during the episode, but I cannot shake that feeling that as soon as she heard Ai's name, she felt a bit envious. The spiral of her pupil both feels like instability compared that if the direction went and draw the pupil opaque and well-rounded for that shot as she is trying to figure out what is going on. she is also wrapped up in mix-feelings : she wants to help and better understand Aqua and at the same time she is envious of his "obsession" with Ai.

I may need to pay better attention to the acting because I have rewatched S1 episodes since they aired, but yeah, on first watch, this was how it felt to me.

Oshi no Ko 150: Mistranslation or Miscommunication?

Something I was surprised to see in the aftermath of OnK 150 were accusations from the English fanbase that the chapter had been mistranslated or that the content of it had been misrepresented somehow. I fully admit that I was extremely skeptical of this assertion when I first saw it crop up given but MangaPlus's translations do have an unfortunate habit of flubbing minor details in places that do lead to pretty major cascading errors with the English script. It's possible it could have happened, especially in a chapter operating on dream logic as this one does, so I decided to take a look at the JP text myself and see if this was the case. And what I took away was… no, the English translation is more or less fine. A bit stiff but nothing has been lost or changed from the original text. But since there seems to be a lot of misinfo on this topic going around and I have nothing better to do on a Friday morning I guess, I thought I'd do my best to clear some of it up.

First of all: credentials, I guess? I'm the translator of 45510 and Viewpoint B and I was also part of the team working on Spica, The First Star where I contributed translation efforts as well. Basically I just want to assure folks that I'm not pulling this stuff out of my ass lol

Also apologies that some of these caps from the manga are fucking shmeared with Vaseline, tracking down the JP raws in decent quality was a fucking nightmare this time around for some reason. Anyway!

Black Eyes

The first major point of confusion seems to surround a line from Gorou at the start of page seven, while warning Aqua off from 'Sarina'.

「俺の目が黒い内はさりなちゃんに手ぇ出させねえ からな？」

In initial TLs, this line was translated literally and rendered as "You're not allowed to touch Sarina while your eyes are black!" which immediately caused a flurry of speculation among fans that this was a lore drop, meant to indicate that Aqua was 'not allowed' to be in a relationship with Ruby so long as he had his black hoshigans on - and thus, pursuing a relationship with her would restore them to white. When this line was rendered as "I won't let you make a move on Sarina-chan for as long as I live!" in the official TL, a lot of people assumed this was a mistake or an active omission on the part of MangaPlus. I regret to inform everyone that there was a mistranslation here… but uh, it wasn't MangaPlus!

First of all, Gorou is referring to his own eyes, not Aqua's - and furthermore, he's actually using a euphemistic idiom in the vein of 'over my dead body' or 'when hell freezes over'. There is a bit of missing subtext here in that Gorou is specifically expressing a sort of paternalistic expression and the obvious visual pun of Aqua's black hoshigans but MangaPlus's line gets at what Gorou is actually saying here. So no, unless Akasaka is playing a Ryukishi07 Umineko tier wordplay foreshadowing trick on us, I think we can take this at face value as just a brief gag.

'Good Enough'?

Another point of contention from this same page is a seemingly minor note of potential ambiguity with regards to Aqua's feelings for Ruby. When discussing their relationship at Gorou's prompting, Aqua states that Ruby is 'his precious little sister' with the following phrasing:

「世界でたった一人の大切な妹。それだけで良い。」

MangaPlus renders the 「それだけで良い。」 part of this line as "That's all that matters". Pretty much since the moment this chapter dropped, I've seen people insist that this is a mistranslation and that initial pre-official TLs of "That's good enough for me" are more accurate - that there is some sense of 'settling' or resignation on Aqua's part, that he does want to be with Ruby but he'll settle for being her brother and that the official TL erases this nuance.

My take on this is… eh. That's kind of a stretch.

Obviously, context is everything but if that sense of 'settling for good enough' is what Akasaka was wanting to convey, 「それだけで良い。」 feels off to me - I would say that 「それで十分だ。」 would be a much more natural choice of words and in fact, we already have at least once instance of this phrasing being used in OnK to express a similar sentiment and being rendered similarly in official TLs as "That by itself is enough."

When it comes to 「それだけで良い。」, "that's good enough" is a perfectly fine TL for it… but so is "that's all that matters", honestly! Depending on context, anything from "That's all there is to it", "That's plenty by itself", "That's all I want" or even "Just that is enough" are all perfectly fine ways to render this idea in English and I don't think the official TL is missing any nuance not suggested by the art. If I can be frank, this attachment to the 'good enough' phrasing in the English seems to come from this being the wording that was initially used by leakers and that it is just slightly more favorable to Ruby in terms of potential to be an endgame heroine.

The Japanese text is just as favorable or unfavorable to Ruby as the official TL is and any ambiguities in that regard exist in both versions of the text. Do with that as you will.

Tensing Up

This is moreso something I've see on Twitter as opposed to the sub but I thought it was worth addressing: when discussing Aqua's supposed feelings for Kana, Gorou phrases it as such:

「星野アクアとして、思春期らしい年相応の恋愛感情を抱えていた。」

MangaPlus translates this as "As Aqua Hoshino, you have romantic feelings that are appropriate to your age as an adolescent." This is pretty much exactly as he phrases things in Japanese (i.e, he specifically says 恋愛感情 renai kanjou, romantic feelings not just vaguely defined 'love'), but the point of contention sees to be whether this is still the case and that Gorou was specifically talking in the past tense about something that is no longer the case.

This is actually the opposite of what Gorou is saying here: in the part of the sentence that refers to Aqua having these feelings, Gorou uses the phrasing of 抱えていた, which indicates that this state or action is present tense and ongoing.

If I can speculate, this insistence on past tense phrasing seems to come from the fact that feeding Gorou's original line into MTLs such as Google Translate or DeepL returns this past tense phrasing… oops lol.

Bits and Bobs

Just some smaller bits of confusion I've seen floating around that didn't really warrant their own sections…

There seems to be this weird misinfo scrap going around that Aqua switches to referring to himself as 「僕」 (boku) as his first person pronoun after waking from his dream as opposed to 「俺」 (ore), which is what he'd been using in his dream and what Gorou had been using too - thus implying that 「僕」 (boku) is Aqua's 'true self' with no Gorou influence. This… uh, is flatly not the case! Putting aside that Aqua doesn't say anything at all after waking up, (I FUCKED UP, YES HE DOES SAY SOMETHING AND DOES SWITCH TO BOKU, I'M SORRYYYYYYYY) codeswitching between 'boku' and 'ore' as a first person pronoun is not super uncommon and is more to do with context and politeness than anything else - 'boku' is more polite and more appropriate for formal environments whereas 'ore' is always informal. You might switch back and forth between the two depending on who you're talking to - busting out an 'ore' at work would be like going "hey boss, ya boy just finished those financial reports, bitch" so…!

In addition, Aqua has used 'boku' before when distinguishing between "the reincarnator" and "the identity of Aqua Hoshino", so until we see the next chapter and get more Aqua dialogue, I don't know to what degree (if any!) it indicates about pronoun usage differentiating between Gorou and Aqua.

The other bit of discussion I've seen as pertains to the translation is whether Kana's line in the final page - translated by MangaPlus as 'I'm seriously in love' - was a reference to LoveNow's title or if she used the word 'gachikoi' there in Japanese as Ruby does in 143. The answer to both of those is a resounding 'nope'. Kana's line in that final page is 「私は本気の恋をしている。」, while LoveNow's Japanese title is 「今からガチ恋始めます」. Specifically, Kana describes her feelings as 本気の恋 (honki no koi), i.e, seriously, earnestly, truly in love, whereas both LoveNow and Ruby use the term ガチ恋 (gachikoi), a slang term referring to a fan who considers themselves to be legitimately in romantic love with a celebrity/idol/etc. Gachikoi is also how the first generation of B-Komachi are described in both Viewpoint B and 45510 in the original Japanese text.

Shakers of Salt

This is pretty much everything I saw floating around and I am not personally super interested in litigating every line of text in this chapter, BUT - if there's anything you feel was confusing about this chapter's TL in particular or anything that felt off or crunchy, I'd be happy to clarify stuff in the comments!

Ultimately my motivation here was to sooth the itch triggered by seeing my pet peeve pop up, which is people spreading misinfo about the original language text of a work lol. As I said up top, I was immediately skeptical once claims like this started popping up because "actually, this was mistranslated and the original Japanese text just so happens to word for word support my argument actually" is a song and dance I've done a whole lot of times before. I did my time in the Persona fandom, I'm not going back to this!!!

That being said: absolutely fact check me on this! If any of this smells stinky to you, get a second, third and fourth opinion from other parties, do your own research and come to your own conclusions. "People in fandoms will misrepresent the original language text of a work to support their agendas" is not something I am exempt from just because I have done my own translations and the last thing I want is to inadvertently perpetuate bullshit about a language or culture that is not mine. If you take anything from this, it's to do your own research and ultimately see where you come down on this sort of thing.

7th Time Loop Opening & Ending

Commentary by OP & ED Storyboard Artist/Director, Ryosuke Nakamura

Saw this interview in Japanese using google translator (link in the source of the post) and the director got into a lot of details of how he views the story and how he represented it in the OP and ED videos! I wanted to bring parts of it here:

OPENING

Nakamura: "The opening depicts the world from Rishe's perspective. Rishe is a person who brings happiness to the world, but at the same time, she is a person who sees the world with happiness."

"The opening image has the image of being immersed in a world of 'euphoria'. On the other hand, for the ending, I wanted an image of someone being alienated from this world of 'euphoria'."

Interviewer: "there were also some ominous cuts in which Rishe, wearing a nightgown, was walking towards the sea before dawn, as if she was trying to reach out to the horizon."

Nakamura: "The sea over there is in 3D, but it has a real and disturbing feel to it, which was really good. As I mentioned earlier, for Rishe, the horizon was the point in her life that she couldn't cross, the point where she looped.  And I think Rishe's way of life is to try to reach out towards that, to try to surpass it someday. [...] In the main story, Rishe works really hard to achieve that goal. That's rare. I think that's why everyone wants to support her."

The interviews comments how we see a few shots of Rishe sleeping in the opening and the director says that's Rishe's goal, and for her, life is a loop away so it's okay to relax now, though she doesn't actually do that.

The interviewer mentions how in a previous interview, the author Touko Amekawa explained how Rishe operates under the idea of working hard/suffering now so she can have an easy and carefree time someday later.

I'm also including here some verses of the song (translation from animesonglyrics):

Sever the thread of destiny Hey, play more freely, boldly Rewrite even a second of the present

Don't cloud transparent impulses with someone's fate theory Pierce through beyond the period Because surely the future can be changed

and from the full version:

Carve the silhouette of hope Advance without doubting your own possibilities

From this morning called today, a new light begins Shining brightly before my eyes Another irreplaceable birthday

ENDING

"In the ending, it seemed like [Arnold's] injury was healing."

Nakamura: "That injury wasn't just physical, it was also emotional..."

"When I had a meeting with director Kazuya Iwata, he told me, 'The ending song has a different perspective than the opening song'.

The song was ordered with the opening scene from Rishe's perspective and the ending scene from Arnold's perspective...Well, actually, there was more to the story than that from the ending's point of view [but let's leave it at that]".

About the flower petals: "each petal is a memory of your life that is looped over and over again. Each memory has different emotions, which is why it has different colors. It's in Arnold's hands at the end of the opening, and it continues as a motif at the ending..."

"Arnold just lives in a dark, dark world, and beyond that, he doesn't understand his own feelings. That hasn't been depicted in the original work yet, and I think it will be depicted in the future, so I apologize if my expression deviates from that. Still, in terms of visual expression, I thought I should go one step further and depict Arnold's feelings as I could imagine them at this point."

This reminds me I've seen the author say something on twitter about how Arnold is slowly learning to express (or was it understand?) his feelings thanks to Rishe throughout the story!

"This is what led me to decide to have the ending be set in an 'what if' world, with the two children surrounded by other characters. [...] That's why the ending flashback is in the world Arnold desired in his heart. It's designed so that you can see that it's not a real landscape from the past. The aim of the production was to create an indescribable sense of loneliness in the audience's hearts when they realized this. For me, Arnold's mental landscape was something like that."

"Rishe and Arnold did not meet when they were children. Therefore, everything is a story of a fantasy world, and to go even further, it is an ideal world that would not have happened that way. "

"Although they met much later, in reality they have been sharing their lives closely for a much longer time."

Interviewer: "I think that what is depicted there is very happy, but when I actually watched the video, I felt that I could see a certain sadness in it."

Nakamura: "From Arnold's point of view, would it be a "feeling of loss"? A person who knows that he is far removed from happiness, which actually did not happen. That is my understanding of Arnold as a person. When this is expressed as a video, the scene is supposed to depict happiness, but for some reason it gives off a sense of loneliness. The aim of the production was to convey that flavor."

And here are some verses (translations by animesonglyrics and lyrical-nonsense):

One by one, each and every fragment Try to put them together The more we collide The clearer the shape becomes Just the two of us, under an unreliable umbrella Hiding together The more we lean on each other The more we understand the pain

The smile you showed me Is joyful, joyful, joyful, it won't disappear You're fine just the way you are It's okay not to understand I'll hold your hand countless times On the path you walk

And may I add: In episode 11, after Arnold asks Rishe not to do anything too crazy so he won't have to send her away, she responds that she'll do what she wants anyway and if she has to leave, she will just find another way to return to Galkhein and his life, so he doesn't have to worry.

ALSO, episode 12 second title is "I'll go with you again and again, the way you live."

Love Square Screen Time Records

Hey, everyone! As some of you may know, I've recently completed calculating the exact screen time for all the love square ships for all the episodes we have up until now, including the Miraculous World Specials. Now I've decided to list all the noteworthy moments in love square screen time based on the data I've collected.

We're going to start with doing some general overall records, then we're going to see the noteworthy moments of love square screen time for all the love square ships individually. so let's begin, shall we?

General Records

Of course it's "Cat Blanc' of all episodes to not only be the first episode to have screen time for all the love square ships, but also the only episode by far to have screen time for all the love square ships. It's already one of the greatest episodes of all time, so why not add some screen time for all the love square ships with it too?

We have the Adrienette dating montage, the battle between Ladybug and Cat Blanc, Adrien saving Marinette from akumatization as Cat Noir and revealing his identity along with it too, and finally Ladybug starting this mess by coming in to deliver her gift to Adrien, allowing him to catch her and piece together her identity.

2. First episode to include none of the love square ships: Representation

Closely followed by "Conformation" as the second. Who does this episode have to thank for to having this record? Gabriel, of course. Since Gabriel sent his his son to London specifically so that he can't spend time with his girlfriend anymore, this was the result. Adrien and Marinette weren't able to get together again until the end of "Re-Creation".

3. Love square ship with the most screen time in an episode: Adrienette in "Oblivio"

Not that surprising since a lot of the episode was spent in Adrien and Marinette running from the titular villain and re-learning who they are. It was only towards the end that they were able to figure out how to activate their powers again, thanks to Master Fu, giving Adrienette a total of 9 min 3 sec of screen time in this episode.

Adrienette Records

Since this episode already has the title for ship with most screen time in an episode, it will obviously also have the the title for episode with with the most Adrienette screen time. No need to repeat what I said earlier.

2. Season with most Adrienette screen time: season 5

No surprise here. We don't need to know the exact screen time to know that this season was full of Adrienette. First third of the season had a few patches of Adrienette here and there but from "Transmission" onwards we had a continuous stream of Adrienette content up until "Revolution" where Gabriel separated them by sending Adrien to London, after which the only got back together at the end of "Re-Creation".

Even though Adrienette didn't dominate this season like Ladynoir does every season, it still had over a third of the love square screen time and had 45 min 57 sec of screen time this season which a lot more than it usually has.

3. Season with least Adrienette screen time: season 4

Just like the other love square ships this season, Adrienette took a significant hit, having been reduced to having 12 min 38 sec of screen time as opposed to its usual half hour of screen time per season (roughly). It makes sense though considering that this season is more focused on the plot than past seasons have been and this is supposedly the season of Ladynoir.

4. Miraculous World Special with most Adrienette: New York Special

Makes sense for this to be the special with the most Adrienette as this special had the plotline of Marinette trying to be nothing more than a friend to Adrien, giving us a total of 7 min 40 sec of Adrienette in this 1-hour special, even surpassing Ladynoir in screen time.

5. First episode Adrienette surpasses Ladynoir in screen time: Gamer

Yes, this is an actual category since it's usually the norm for Ladynoir to have the most screen time in an episode. Not only was this the first episode where Adrienette surpasses Ladynoir in screen time, it's the first episode where any ship surpasses Ladynoir in screen time, and also the sole episode in season 1 where an episode surpasses Ladynoir in screen time. Adrien and Marinette being partners in the Mecha Strike tournament really did well to increase the Adrienette screen time.

Ladynoir Records

Kind of an interesting episode to have as the one with the most Ladynoir but OK. This part had the secondary heroes up until now put out of commission by scarlet akumatization in the first few minutes of the episode, leaving Ladynoir to fend for themselves, them against the world just as always.

2. Season with most Ladynoir screen time: season 1

Of course it's season 1 with the most Ladynoir screen time, with this being the show being at its most formulaic at this time, leading the focus to be more on the usual battle with the akumatized villains than with progressing the plot, gives us a total of 1 hr 53 min 26 sec of screen time that season which is nearly 2 hours.

3. Season with the least Ladynoir screen time: season 4

Ironically, the supposed Ladynoir season had the least Ladynoir screen time out of all the seasons. Despite it having the most screen time in terms of percentage, it still had the least screen time in terms of actual value, having a total of 59 min 24 sec of screen time this season, which isn't even an entire hour, although it's pretty close. But since this season focused more on the plot progression than any season we had before, it makes sense.

4. Miraculous World Special with most Ladynoir screen time: New York

Similar to Adrienette, Ladynoir also gets the most screen time it's ever gotten in the New York Special, and just like Adrienette it makes sense given that this special had a lot of focus on their relationship and how Cat Noir broke Ladybug's trust by coming to New York, giving us a total of 6 min 29 sec of screen time.

Maricat Records

Out of all the designated Maricat episodes, this was the one that got the most screen time for Maricat having a total of 8 min 14 sec of screen time. Makes sense, given that the whole episode was them practicing Marinette being able to confess her love to Adrien and going on a "date". "Elation" would be a worthy contender but as it turns out it didn't have nearly as much screen time as we thought though it was still a fair five and a half minutes.

2. Season with most Maricat screen time: Season 4

While season 4 had the least amount of screen time for Adrienette and Ladynoir, it had the most amount of screen time for Maricat, although it was only featured in 3 episodes of season 4 and most of the screen time was concentrated in "Sentibubbler" and "Glaciator 2". This gives it a total of 9 min 44 sec.

3. Season with least Maricat screen time: Season 2

Season 2 had Maricat take a huge hit due to which it became the ship with least screen time in a season for the first time. It only really got to shine a little bit in the designated Maricat episode of the season "Glaciator" and other than that had small moments in "Befana" and "Anansi", leaving it with 4 min 7 sec of screen time in the entire season.

4. First episode Maricat surpasses Ladynoir in screen time: Weredad

After 2 seasons of Ladynoir taking away their designated episode of the season, Maricat was finally able to surpass Ladynoir in screen time with 3 min 57 sec of screen time. Considering that the episode revolves around Marinette getting herself into the mess of Cat Noir thinking she has feelings for him and the awkward date between them set up by Tom and Ladynoir was only present at the beginning and towards the end of the episode, you can see why.

Ladrien Records

The episode where Ladybug entrusts Adrien with the Snake Miraculous gets the title of the episode with the most Ladrien screen time. It's obvious why since a good portion of the episode is Adrien as Aspik trying to woo Ladybug and failing terribly because he's focused more on that rather than defeating the titular villain.

2. Season with most Ladrien screen time: Season 2

After only having most of its screen time concentrated towards the end of the season aside from "The Bubbler" and "The Mime" in season 1, Ladrien was finally able to get its moment to shine in season 2 with there being several episodes focuses extensively on Ladrien, some even surpassing Ladynoir in screen time, giving it a total of 8 min 46 sec in the entire season which is the most it will ever get as from here on out it, its screen time decreases with ever season.

3. Season with least Ladrien screen time: season 5

Ladrien already usually gets the short end of the stick in Miraculous due to it's lack of a requirement for any development, so naturally, season 5 ends up being the season with the least Ladrien screen time, with us only getting Ladrien in "Passion" with detransformed Adrien holding a Venomed Ladybug and the small scene in "Deflagration" of Adrien handing Ladybug's Miraculous to her. Hopefully, future seasons will give us more Ladrien, but I doubt it.

4. First episode Ladrien surpasses Ladynoir in screen time: Riposte

Since season 2 was the first time Ladrien ever got to shine, it also contains the episode where Ladrien surpasses Ladynoir in screen time, that being the first Ladrien-focused episode of the season, "Riposte" involving the titular villain going after Adrien, hence Ladybug having to protect him and Adrien being unable to go off somewhere to transform.

Conclusion

Well, that's it for all the love square screen time records. Let me know what you think about them and feel free to find any other notable records in love square screen time history by checking my work here. Until next time!

Arima Kana has one type and it's the Hoshino twins.

She is going to end with one of them, I don't care which one, but she will one way or another.

Not, but seriously, I love how this episode is Kana AND THE HOSHINO TWINS. Not Kana and Aqua, Kana and Aqua & Ruby.

Let me explain:

First we have Aqua and Kana, which is one of my favorites relationships in this manga. I love how Aqua has always believed in her and in this scene that shows perfectly (one of my favorites scenes between them and in general btw).

Aqua is willing to disguise himself as a fricking chicken to be able to be there for Kana. Guide her. Reassure her. Tell her that she is doing greatly and he is a fan of her. He is not afraid to do "shameful" things if that means to be there for her friend.

And is beautiful, because Aqua says constantly that he doesn't care, but he does, a lot actually, and if a friend needs him he is going to be there no matter what.

Secondly we have Ruby and Kana, and I think their relationships is overshadowed by Aqua and Kana, but that doesn't make it less beautiful.

Despite Ruby mocking attitude with her, Ruby respects her a lot in her own way. She is the first to chastise Kana for saying she is "bad" or "not enough"

She believes in Kana, she always had, since chapter three she has done anything but to show how much she believes in Kana's abilities. And yet, she doesn't put her in a pedestal, Ruby doesn't care of she is famous, if she has failed or succeed, she doesn't expect her to be perfect.

No, the only thing she has asked about Kana is to give everything she has, and that's enough. If they fail, if the succeed, that doesn't matter, because they tried; and they are a team, that's not a weakness, but rather a strenght, the reassurance they will be together in the good, the bad and the horrible.

You can't tell me that isn't love. Romantic, platonic, call it what you want, but Kana and the Hoshino twins have such a sweet relationship of lifting themselves up when they fail and be there for the other always, no matter what.

I love this anime so much and this arc Is one of my favorites.

Sometimes I think about how Adrien, throughout the series, constantly grapples with his fear of abandonment. Gabriel conditioned him to believe that any love he receives is purely transactional, and that to earn affection he has to prove his utility. Adrien is constantly trying to prove his worth to his father for scraps of affection, and Chat Noir infamously crumbles on-screen any time he feels as though he is replaceable to Ladybug. It's a constant insecurity of his, like everyone will just dump him like a sack of potatoes the moment they find out how useless he is.

Meanwhile, all Marinette wants to is ensure that Adrien is happy. Because she loves him. She doesn't give two shits about how """useful""" he is. She holds him and tells him that she will never abandon him (both as Ladynoir and as Adrienette), and her fantasies are about saving him, not about him being "useful" to her. Throughout their relationship, Adrien is forced to disappoint Marinette constantly for reasons outside of his control (amok commands), and yet Marinette is still there for him.

At Adrien's lowest point, when he is forcibly torn away from everyone who had ever showed him genuine care, locked away in an all-white room and at his most "useless", right after disappointing Marinette and unable to even join the final battle or contribute in any way, she still saves him. She still loves him. Because he doesn't have to prove anything to her. Because he is loved and cherished for who he is, not for what he does, and that love is not conditional. Adrien's "happy ending" at the end of the first arc wasn't about him finally proving how useful he can be, because he never actually cared about being useful — he just saw it as the only means to feel loved and needed. Instead, in the end, he found out that he was loved and needed no matter what.